Thor Ramsey - A Comedians Guide to Theology

2008 Thor Ramsey

Published by Revell
a division of Baker Publishing Group
P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.revellbooks.com

Revell edition published 2014

ISBN 978-1-4412-2560-3

Previously published by Regal Books

Ebook edition originally created 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meansfor example, electronic, photocopy, recordingwithout the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Other version used is NASB Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE, Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

If this thing doesnt sell, this may be my one and only chance, so
Id like to dedicate this book to Dinika and Eden. I love you both.
Officially and in print.

If you care about Truth at all, then you should buy this book, because the truth is, I need the money. Even if you dont care about Truth, then buy this book if you care about kids, because I have a lovely seven-year-old daughter who will one day need braces. Im sorry to pose a moral dilemma if you happen to be browsing at the bookstore, but if you put this book down now youre basically turning your back on a child.

The importance of Truth is obvious, because it is capitalized. Presently, there is a crisis of Truth within the evangelical Church. People keep saying that we are on a journey to a new era, the postmodern era. Well, wake me up when we get there. Its not that I dont care about postmodernism, its just that I have to take Dramamine on long trips, and it makes me drowsy.

The idea of Truth is being assaulted from many different angles. Allow me to illustrate the problem, since I have a laptop and am writing a book. When I was a child, my sister once said to me, Mom said to clean your room. I told her, I believe youre misquoting my mother. Whenever someone says something you dont like, just claim theyre being misquoted. This guy named Bart Ehrman wrote a book titled Misquoting Jesus because, apparently, Jesus told him to clean his room. Bart is a former youth group member who now makes a living weakening the faith of believers and their pets. (I can only assume that the pets inherit the faith of their guardians.) Hes a former evangelical,a lapsed insider now attacking the faith from without. I just think hes an enlarged apostate, which I believe means that he has to go to the bathroom a lot.

I also read a book by Sam Harris, an atheist who more than resembles Ben Stiller. His book is called The End of Faith, which basically says, Muslims want to blow people up because of their holy book, the Koran. Christianity and Judaism have a holy book too, so they shouldnt be let off the hook just because they havent killed anyone in the last thousand years. You should embrace rationalism and treat other people nice because well, the Golden Rule is a good thing. Sam tells me to abandon my faith, and all he has for me at the end is the Golden Rule? Buddy, thats already ours. So, really, Im right back where I started.

Sam is trying to attack the faith, but mostly he just makes journalists feel better about being anti-religious. (My apologies to journalists who arent anti-religious, but unfortunately for you, comedy works best with sweeping generalities.)

Its the assault on Truth from within the Church that currently concerns me. (Yes, Im out to save the essentials of Christianity. You can thank me later.) You see, in case youve forgotten from four paragraphs ago, were entering the postmodern era, which means bellbottoms are really out of style. Or not. The thing is, you cant say with any certainty that bellbottoms are out of style, because the very nature of Truth is being questioned unless the truth happens to be how much you have to pay for the bellbottoms. Then Truth is pretty absolute. Even at these outlet malls, the cashiers dont seem to be embracing postmodernism.

It is often said that it doesnt matter what you believe as long as youre sincere. My mother-in-law believes that Im an idiot. Well, okay, sometimes you can be sincere and right. But my point is, what if she had been wrong? You see? Sometimes sincerity doesnt change the Truth.

Lots of people, myself included, believe that Truth is an unchanging reality that doesnt alter whether you do or dont like it or agree with it. If a comedian isnt funny, the emcee will go up after his set and ask the crowd, Well, did you at least like his shoes? Thats the traditional view of Truth. It corresponds with reality.

There is another view of truth within the Church now, and its not capitalized. That shows you how serious things have become. The new view of truth espoused by many prominent writers, thinkers and pastors is that we are trapped in the language of our particular cultures. Thus communication between various people groups becomes difficult because we all have ways of saying things that are particular to our group. The question is, If words arent reliable, then why should we listen to anything these people have to say? Now, I dont want to bore you with a heady and scholarly argument against this idea of being trapped inside language, so let me just give you the gist of the counterargument: Thats stupid. There. That pretty much sums it up. Did you understand me? You did? Thats because were not trapped inside of language.

Some of these Christian leaders are part of a young movement in evangelicalism called the emerging church, which I will explain below. Now, I consider myself part of the emerging church, but Im emerging more along the lines of people like John Burke, though he is much nicer than I am; Shane Claiborne, minus the influence of male pattern baldness; and Mark Driscoll, without his tenacious Calvinismall people that I will not explain below. But Im probably only part of the emerging church because I cannot bring myself to wear a tie. (If youre wearing a tie and you tell someone youre a Christian, they think youre Mormon.)

Heres the part where I explain below. (It means beneath or lower.)

Okay, if youre not familiar with the emerging church, just ask anyone who considers himself (or herself) part of the movement and that person will explain it to you in around a billion words. They dont want to be boxed in, so they define it until you either kill them or kill yourself, which can really put a damper on emerging. Generally, emerging Christians can be found wherever there is a group of disgruntled white guys. Rather than biblical exposition, most emerging Christians prefer blended coffee. Proponents of the emerging church shy away from dogma and such ideas as proclaiming Christ as exclusive Lord and Savior, which is really encouraging to the Persecuted Church around the world where Christians are still being killed for their faith. The emerging church also practices loving tolerance, especially if you throw around buzzwords like generous, missional, relational, authentic, narrative and conversation. When participating in an emerging church service, avoid throwing around words like heresy, which they are less tolerant of.

The Emergent Church movement seeks to appeal to postmodern people by denying